DMA
Responds to Consumer Popularity of ‘Do Not Mail’
Lists
This weekend, Catalog Choice added the 400,000th
member to its database of consumers who have asked
to be removed from catalog mailing lists. Direct
marketers and the DMA have taken notice.

Launched in October by the Ecology Center and
endorsed by the National Wildlife Federation and the
Natural Resources Defense Council, the nonprofit
Catalog Choice (www.catalogchoice.org)
is among a handful of new services that have popped
up in the past year to help consumers reject
unwanted direct mail. Environmental concerns have
helped fuel that desire. A headline on the Catalog
Choice home page exhorts consumers to “Simplify your
life and save natural resources.”

Responding to the popularity of such sites, the
Direct Marketing Association has beefed up it own
opt-out service, called Mail Preference Service
(MPS), which has been available to consumers for
many years and enables them to opt out of direct
mail

Last month, the DMA did away with the $1 fee it
previously charged consumers for registering with
MPS, and it enhanced the service so that consumers
can now opt out of particular catalogs and brands
individually. Previously, the DMA service only gave
the option of opting out of all commercial mail.

“We improved the site to allow the capability to opt
in and opt out of individual brands,” said Steve
Berry, exec VP-government affairs and corporate
responsibility at DMA. “We upgraded the site so you
can do that via the Internet.”

In addition, preferences are updated more frequently
these days. “We also now require all our members to
run their lists against the MPS list every month
instead of every 90 days,” Berry said.

Berry readily admits the changes were made in
response to new groups such as Catalog Choice.

“It is in response to these groups that have popped
up, as well as surveys we’ve done,” he said.
“Consumers say they want more choice and they also
want to make eco-friendly choices. It was a wake-up
to the industry. There is pent-up demand out there.
As direct marketers, it is our job to listen to the
consumer.”
George Ittner, president of apparel catalog The
Territory Ahead, said third-party opt-out providers
are not only unnecessary but confuse the process.

“I think we provide a valuable service to the
consuming public by printing catalogs containing
quality merchandise for their selection or
rejection,” he said. “They can contact us directly
or through DMA. Why should we have third parties
that want to pile on?”

One of Ittner’s concerns about third parties is data
integrity.

"I think Catalog Choice is confusing, and there are
issues in my mind about the integrity of their
data,” he said. “What are they doing with the names
that they get? Are they using them for marketing
purposes?” Ittner also said he is concerned about
how marketers can verify that the names provided by
these third parties are legitimate.

A database industry source said catalog merchants
such as Ittner are taking different approaches when
it comes to services like Catalog Choice. “Some are
processing the opt-outs, but many aren’t because
they don’t trust the data and its integrity,” said
this observer, who asked to remain anonymous.
Another worry is that Catalog Choice and others are
sending address information through e-mail, which
“is not a secure mode of transmission for sensitive
data,” according to the source.

DMA agreed, noting that third-party opt-out lists
are neither verified nor authenticated, and that
there is no explicit promise from the third parties
that consumer address data will not be used for
marketing purposes.

But the DMA will need to react quickly if it hopes
to avoid a repeat of the National Do-Not-Call
Registry, one of the most popular pieces of
legislation in recent history. At the time,
observers said marketers and the DMA were too slow
to react meaningfully to consumer complaints and
paid the price in the form of a federal law.
Currently, nine state legislatures are considering
bills that would create state-run do-not-mail
registries.

Meanwhile, a pro direct mail group that is part of
the DMA called Mail Moves America is working with
state business groups and communicating with
legislators about the importance of direct mail for
consumers, businesses and the economy in order to
lobby against the creation of a do-not-mail list.